Words
by Carolina Nadeau
Summary: As a librarian and lover of books, Marian Paroo Hill has always considered words to be her area of expertise – but even with her husband Harold, there are certain things that she's just not comfortable putting into words...


_Spring break = lots and lots of time for recreational writing. This is a sort of follow-up to Sense and Sensuality that I started shortly after finishing that story, but I could never really figure out where I was going with it. Recently I was going through my little unfinished fanfic snippets, and ended up feeling inspired to expand this one into a complete story. I really didn't intend for this to be M-rated, but that somehow turned out to be the only direction in which I could get this conversation to go!  
_

xxx

Although River City's librarian Marian Paroo loved her library very much, it was not truly _hers_ – but since she had married her beloved Harold Hill a little over a month ago, she finally had a library of her own, in a certain sense.

As the house that Harold had purchased and furnished for them had quite a few rooms, he had purposed a cozy room with a fireplace on the second floor into a study, a decadent wood-and-leather room with a large mahogany desk, several chairs and lamps, a sofa – and one wall lined with bookshelves, which had been mostly empty when he had first revealed the room to her upon their return from their honeymoon. But the librarian had made short work of that, between the many books that she had brought from her old bedroom and the ones that Harold had been thoughtful enough to buy her for wedding presents. Between the music room, the study, the wonderfully luxurious parlor and bedroom – and, of course, the husband that she loved more than anything in the world – Marian was certain that she could not conceive of a house containing more things to delight her.

One snowy January evening, Marian had retreated to the study after dinner to see which one of her books she should delve into next. She had already read almost all of them in the past, of course, but the reason that she had desired them for her personal library was because she loved them so much, and the idea of revisiting any of them was wonderful. Basking in the flickering warmth of the fire, she ran her hands along the spines, breathed in the pleasant scents of new and old pages... there was a sort of rapture in this ritual, and even more so knowing that she had all of these wonderful books in the comfort of her very own home.

Her thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the sound of footsteps coming toward the study from the bedroom.

"Marian, I just found another box of your books," Harold called down the hall to her.

"That's strange," she answered, genuinely baffled. "I can't imagine what's in it – I was certain I'd unpacked them all!"

Her eyes scanned over the shelf, trying to jog her memory of any missing titles, but could think of none. Each of the books in her small personal library mattered very much to her, and she found it hard to believe that she could have simply forgotten about some. Certainly she would have noticed if an entire carton of books had not made the transfer over to her new home!

As her husband entered the doorway of the study, Marian stood up from where she was kneeling to meet him – and then almost fell right back down. She felt her blood turn to ice as she recognized the small box that Harold was carrying – _that_ box, the one that she had been hiding underneath her bed in her old bedroom during her most delicate research project, the one that contained every book that she could find that went into any sort of detail about conjugal relations. How, how, how had it ended up here? How could she have forgotten to return such sensitive materials to the library as soon as possible?

The lid was closed, at least, so maybe he hadn't looked. If she could just get that box into her possession without incident, a crisis could be averted entirely. Without being asked, Marian hastily tugged the box from his hands and hurried back to the bookshelf, hoping that he would consider his task completed and leave her alone to figure out what to do.

"Th – thank you," she answered, her voice tight and guilty despite all her efforts to sound indifferent. "I'll just – I'll put these – somewhere – "

"Some rather _interesting _books there," Harold teased with raised eyebrows, confirming her worst fears.

"So – you saw," she groaned in anguish. Flipping open the box lid, she saw the dirty books staring incriminatingly back at her. So much for books being a source of comfort – before this moment, she had never felt more humiliated by them.

"It's not what it looks like!" she insisted, stepping back defensively. "They aren't mine. They belong in the library."

"Most of those don't look like the kind of literature that belongs in any public library!" Harold laughed.

"Well, as a matter of fact, they do not. Most of them were just – being stored."

"In your house?"

Marian frowned at him, trying to look as severe and spinsterish as she could manage. "They were in the back closet of the library but they ended up in my house – for a time – and I suppose my mother included this box with the others when she brought my things here in the days after the wedding." She grew even more tense as she realized that there was a fair enough possibility that her mother had seen the contents of the box as well... so much for well-kept secrets.

Harold grinned unapologetically, and to her utter horror, picked up what was perhaps the most shocking volume in the box, an Indian _Kama Sutra_ complete with explicit illustrations – she held her breath and prayed fervently for him not to open it, though she suspected that a man as worldly as he would probably recognize the title anyway.

She cringed visibly when he flipped through the pages of the book and let out a low whistle. "Oh my God," he exclaimed with a chuckle.

Absurdly, she still felt compelled to scold him for his speech, even in the midst of her egregious embarrassment. "Harold, _really_..."

To his credit, Harold respected her feelings on that matter and quickly amended his statement. "Sorry – oh my goodness, I meant – but I can't believe the library ever ended up in possession of books like _this_."

"Most of them aren't _that_ explicit. I mean, most of them don't have illustrations – or, at least, not _many _illustrations."

He cast an amused glance at her over the top of the cover, his smile sneaking wryly up his face.

"Did you read them?"

"What a thing to ask!" she stammered – but she could not bring herself to lie. "If I did," she whispered, "I assure you that my purpose was not lechery. It was research."

He wiggled his eyebrows mischievously at her. "Research? What a delightful topic you chose to explore..."

Though she was aware that he was only teasing, Marian still did not feel comfortable with what he was implying, and she quickly jumped to defend her maiden self. "It's not as if I enjoyed them or anything!"

"Not at all?" Harold murmured, moving closer to her with seductive confidence.

She moved away from him in return, not willing to allow him to turn this subject that was so upsetting to her into an opportunity for flirtation. "I didn't – well, not strictly – what I mean is, I didn't enjoy them for the sake of what they were, but if I imagined you and me..."

He allowed his smile to widen slowly and pointedly. "I see. So the librarian needed to do a little research so she could more accurately fantasize about me?"

Marian slumped to the floor before the bookshelf, planting the box heavily beside her. "You know why, Harold! Such a _topic_ is not considered appropriate to speak about, or to write or read about, but it is one that is greatly concerning to those who plan to be married. So – if one is to attempt an understanding of – this – then one must consult whatever sources she can find, some of which will, yes, be quite tawdry!" She dropped her gaze to the carpet, flushed. "Although I might add that I ultimately found no mere book that could adequately prepare me for, um, the experience."

The professor was still entirely unfazed by her chagrin – he was now kneeling beside her and blithely leafing through a oblique advice manual for young brides, chuckling to himself. "Well, it's a good thing you examined such a wide variety of sources – if you'd taken old 'Mrs. Allen' here at her word, we'd be sleeping in separate bedrooms so as to protect ourselves from the wicked temptations of my _base and_ _animal nature_ – "

"Maybe now you can see why I became so distraught over my own – feelings," Marian laughed, now unable to believe that any married woman could have really written such a book. "Anyway, that's all well behind us now, so if you'll just put those _down_ so I can get them back to the library – "

Shrugging his shoulders, he tossed the "Mrs. Allen" manual back at her, and she caught the slim volume just in time with a startled gasp of laughter.

"Oh, you can have back the ones that belong on the shelves, like that delightful little treatise against having any fun, but what of the indecent books? Maybe we'd be safer keeping them here than in a public building where anybody could stumble across them."

Nodding slowly, she sank down onto the brown sofa situated across from the bookshelves. "You could be right. I'd never want to compromise the integrity of the library, and they do, strictly speaking, belong to me. I suppose that we could – perhaps – hide them in the attic, or something," she conceded, but Harold was clearly not satisfied by this answer.

"You mean to say that you'd just hide them away? Never look at them again? Because I would argue that these books have some _very _intriguing potential uses..."

She had expected no less from him, but she still balked at the suggestion. "Harold Gregory Hill! We are not maintaining a private library of – _blue literature_ – in our home!"

"Oh, we would still keep them well hidden. But maybe... we could hide them under the bed instead of in the attic?"

"And then what?" the librarian asked tersely, folding her arms. "You still intend to have us – read them?"

At last seeming to realize that her dismay was entirely genuine, the music professor eased up on his teasing, cast aside the copy of _Fanny Hill_ that he'd picked up, and sat beside her on the sofa, placing his hand gently over hers. "Would that be so bad? You've told me that you've already read most of them yourself. What is it about these books that's upsetting you so much?"

"For one thing, they're illegal," she protested – though this objection was not precisely what was on her mind, it remained a valid one.

At that, however, Harold laughed heartily and shook his head, and Marian turned to him with wide, incredulous eyes – surely he couldn't think that she was wrong about such a simple fact?

"Marian, darling, _everything_ is illegal, according to somebody," he laughed. She stared back at him in bafflement, unable to form any sort of response to such a ludicrous statement before he spoke again. "You and I have probably done something illegal at least a few times a week since we were married, if you think about it."

"I don't know what kind of joke you're making, but it isn't funny," Marian admonished him. "You may have committed more than your fair share of crimes in the past, but our current lifestyle is more than within the law!"

"Within any _reasonable_ law, yes. But there are an awful lot of unreasonable people in the world with a lot of time to spend worrying about what people get up to in their bedrooms, so, yes, they try to make some of it illegal. I believe there exist laws condemning precisely two of the things we did last night, come to think of it." He pointedly tapped a finger once on his lips and once on hers as he smirked at her, making sure that she knew exactly what he was referring to – and that it wasn't kissing.

Certain that she was red all the way to the tips of her ears and her toes, the librarian still couldn't help but laugh in utter disbelief at what he was telling her. "_How_ could anybody possibly know if people are – doing things like that? Why would anybody want to know?"

"I don't have an answer to either question, believe me! But I suppose the point I was making was that if we want to keep these books in the privacy of our own bedroom, there's really nothing anybody can ever do about it, just the same as they can't prevent us from _doing_ whatever we like in there. Buying or selling them – or certainly having them in the public library – would indeed be a terrible risk, but just having them shouldn't be anybody else's business."

"I might be able to concede that point, then. But you still haven't explained _why_ we'd want them. I certainly don't feel the need to consult those sorts of books anymore, and I've seen no indication that y_ou _are lacking knowledge in that particular area!"

Harold looked startled and unsure of how to respond, and for a moment, the librarian feared that her forthright comment had come off as accusatory, though in truth she'd not intended any judgement. As distressing as it was to think about the fact that her husband had been with many other women in his past, his past wasn't a matter that concerned Marian too much these days, now that she was absolutely certain that his love and passion for her was far more real and sacred to him than any of those transient physical affairs had ever been. Just the same as when they were courting and he was giving her a thorough education in the fine art of kissing, she found that, in some odd way, she could embrace and enjoy his exceptional skill as a lover without thinking too deeply about how he'd acquired it – it was simply a part of who he was now, and a part that he could use to make her very happy indeed.

"That was intended as a compliment, darling," she reassured him with a small smile. "I only meant that, well, you've shown me so many wonderful things, and you've implied that there's still many more – I can't imagine that there's anything we'd want to do that you don't know already."

"It's not about knowledge, exactly... it's just that I thought we could make use of some delicious words that we could whisper to each other while we make love. You of all people, Madam Librarian, should know all about the power of words. And when you were alone at night and read all those books, all those words, I bet it must have made you awfully hot for me..."

His remark struck an uncomfortable nerve – did he really think she would be comfortable reading such explicit material aloud when she had yet to learn how to discuss even their own lovemaking in all but the vaguest of terms? When she had read those books the first time, she had felt terribly guilty simply over allowing such luridly descriptive passages into her own mind, and her guilt had only deepened when she found herself aroused by them. All at once, the memories came flooding vividly back to her of those guilty nights she'd spent half-shaking from desire and shame, and she couldn't help but point out that her husband's perception of the situation was highly inaccurate.

"I think you're the one doing the fantasizing here, Harold! Remember, up until we had that conversation in the library, I was _ashamed _of the way that you made me feel, the things that you made me think about, and those books only put more fevered ideas in my head for me to fight off." Wringing her hands together, Marian briefly wondered if she should stop there – but, no, he deserved to know everything. "When I lay in bed and I'd start thinking like that, I was afraid I would do something... very awful."

Harold pulled back and raised an eyebrow at her. "Something 'very awful'?"

"I thought at first that I would be safe from temptation if I wasn't _with_ you, but I learned there was another kind of temptation that I had to fight." She glanced warily at Harold out of the corner of her eye, and was upset to observe that he seemed to be expecting her to continue. "Oh, don't make me say it. Can't you guess?"

"Yes, I can," he murmured softly, letting his fingers dance down the length of her arms. "A lady doesn't do such things, you thought."

Although Harold was attempting to soothe her with the gentle movements of his hands, Marian sat rigid and unresponsive in his arms, too stricken with the shame of those past desires to feel at all comfortable with her current ones. "Of course she doesn't. And I didn't."

"But does a gentleman?"

Marian squeezed her eyes shut in mortification as she contemplated the question. "I imagine that he does," she answered slowly. "That is, I imagine that you did. At the time, I never would have thought of such things, of course, but now I can be quite confident that you did."

"And... does that upset you? Do you think that was very awful of me?"

She knew that she probably shouldn't, but she couldn't help but try to picture what that must have looked like, what he must have been thinking or even _saying _as he urged himself toward that much-needed release that she couldn't have possibly given him yet... the idea of Harold pleasuring himself over heated thoughts of her was anything but repellent, and she shifted in her seat a little, her thighs clenching together involuntarily.

"No, it's – it's intriguing to think about, really," she whispered, her breath quickening. "That you wanted me so much that you just couldn't bear not to do something about it. Oh, you know that I wanted you that much, too, but I just _couldn't_ have done anything, even if I'd known how. I never could have forgiven myself."

"It intrigues me just the same to think about you doing that, darling. It's almost a shame that you never did, passionate little minx that you are." Harold's eyes darkened with smoldering intensity, and she knew he must have been picturing it, too, although the situation _he_ envisioned was entirely fictional. "Of course, I'd never want you to feel ashamed of yourself... and I'd not give up the experience of being the first and only person ever to touch you."

"I'm happy that it was that way," Marian agreed vehemently. "However, um, _frustrated_ that I might have been, I would have felt that I was compromising my virtue, and that would never have been worth it."

"But now you could do it without feeling ashamed, couldn't you?"

She laughed nervously. "Whatever do you mean? Now I wouldn't need to!"

"I should hope you wouldn't _need_ to, not ever again. I'll make sure of that. But you could do it for me." His voice was low with amorous urgency, his lips brushing her ear.

"How could my doing _that _be... for you?" Marian asked, uncomprehending. As much as she wanted to know, however, she found that she was quickly approaching the limits of her modesty with this line of conversation, and she could feel herself shrinking away from her husband.

"Well, it'd be quite a thing to watch."

While the idea he was suggesting was not unappealing, the librarian felt that she had to let Harold know how distraught this conversation was making her. It was one thing to whisper about topics like this when they were already entwined beneath the sheets together, but she couldn't help but feel that the kind of frank discussion that they were having now was somehow cheapening to the sacredness of their intimacy.

"Oh, Harold, please let's not talk about this anymore. I just can't go on sitting here and discussing this _subject_ with you like it's nothing!" She bit her lip as frustrated tears welled up in her eyes. "There are so many nicer things we could be doing tonight."

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Like making love?"

Though she had not specifically been thinking of that, she could not deny that such an activity would be a far more enjoyable pursuit than their current situation.

"For one," she answered in a small voice.

Her husband nodded slowly, and something in his inscrutable expression made Marian worry that she had somehow hurt or offended him. "So you have no trouble admitting that it's a nice thing to do... but it's not a nice thing to talk about."

She felt utterly helpless, caught between her own insecurities and what he seemed to want from her. "It feels so wrong to me to talk about it. I don't think it's meant to be like that," she tried to explain, her words weak and useless even to her own ears.

"But, Marian, it's not wrong," Harold insisted, wrapping his arms around her from behind so she leaned back against him. Despite her unease, she still found welcome comfort in her husband's embrace, and she nestled against him in return. "I want to hear you talk about your desires, your fantasies, anything about our lovemaking, if you have something to say. You shouldn't have to be afraid of the words. Listen to the way you're talking even now... this 'topic', this 'subject', this 'area'. Those kind of words don't mean anything, and you know it. But when we're in bed together and I whisper in your ear, and I use words that _do_ mean something, you love that, don't you?"

"Y – yes."

"So don't you understand why I might want to hear that from you some time?"

Her breath caught in her throat as she realized what he meant. Of course he would want to hear her express her desires – it was only natural that he would want to give her as much pleasure as he could, in the way that would please her best at any particular moment. After all, she felt that way about him. She just didn't know if she was physically capable of uttering the words he wanted to hear.

"I understand," she said softly as she gazed down at her hands, feeling a little guilty that that was the best response that she could currently give him.

She was aware that her reserve in this area could be considered absurd, considering that the previous night had been her boldest yet; she had taken the lead and dared to pleasure him in a way that she had previously only fantasized about, and she'd derived nothing but satisfaction from the entire event. Yet when it came to pronouncing a few words out loud, she was sure that the earth would open up and swallow her whole for such dreadfully unladylike behavior.

As he held her and soothed her fears away, he began attending to her hair, a surprising but wonderfully intimate ritual. Painstakingly, her husband slid the pins from her chignon, depositing them on the nearby end table, and unwound her flowing curls, running his hands through them as they fell across her shoulders. Perhaps because he had always expressed his fondness for its color, perhaps because the first time he had seen it unpinned was on their wedding night, perhaps because it was a sight that nobody got to see except for him, but there was something incredibly erotic about Harold paying such attention to her hair; she leaned back against his chest, her breath now coming in quick little gasps as his fingers danced across the nape of her neck. All the uncertainties that she had been feeling seemed to drop away in the face of this simple truth, that she loved him, wanted him, _needed_ him, that no embarrassing books or words could taint the purity of that passion.

"You know that I love you," he whispered in her ear. "I love making love to you, and I love that _you_ love making love to me... and I don't want there to be any shame in that for you, ever."

Almost hypnotized by the _click-click-click_ of the hairpins on the table, by the cozy crackling of the fireplace, by the warmth of his body and the aroma of his aftershave and cologne, she felt that she could speak more calmly about the whole thing. "I'm not ashamed of what we _do_, I just... can't talk about it."

"I need you to talk about it, though." His tone was intense, almost pleading, and after a moment he seemed to think better of it, reassuring her with gentler words. "I don't want to pressure you, sweetheart, but I'd so love for you to be able to tell me what you want."

From a practical standpoint, Marian couldn't quite see why he was so concerned over this detail – after all, every single time they had made love had been incredibly intimate, joyous, and pleasurable for her, and she had certainly made sure that he knew it, so why did he worry that she might be seeking something different from him?

"You know what I want, Harold, you always do," she tried to reassure him.

"No, darling. I know what _I_ want, and that inevitably ends up being something that you find very nice as well. But that's not the same as you telling me."

With her hair now cascading freely over her shoulders, Harold brushed it back from her neck and began caressing the sensitive skin there with his lips and tongue, and Marian melted happily into his embrace, tilting her head to give him better access. Here was the language of lovemaking that she felt comfortable with, no words needed, just the natural, sensual rhythms of their bodies that had been pulling them inexorably together since the moment they had first laid eyes on each other. Words were for the practical, the intellectual, the sweet and sentimental, but _this_ was something else entirely.

Evidently, the professor had momentarily relinquished his insistence on words as well, as he was at the moment much more interested in freeing his wife from the many layers of clothing that society deemed proper. As he lavished her neck with love bite after love bite, his hands went to work unbuttoning her blouse immediately, and he was already halfway through unlacing her corset before it occurred to her that he usually brought her to the bedroom before things progressed this far.

When, instead of making any move to escort her from the study, he instead urged her down so she was lying beneath him and they were even _more_ entangled in their current position, Marian was too curious not to inquire about his plans. As he had so often done to her, she tapped him under the chin to encourage him to look her in the eyes, a role reversal that seemed to bewilder him for a moment.

She raised her eyebrows playfully, wanting to assure him that, though she was surprised, she was not uncomfortable with the situation. "Here?" she asked with a note of amusement in her voice.

"Yes, here," Harold affirmed. "Is that a problem?" Reaching beside her, he gently positioned the red throw pillow behind her neck and shoulders, demonstrating that the study could prove most conducive to the continuance of their activities.

"Not at all. I _want_ to," she told him as her hands found the buttons of his shirt, hoping that such an encouragement would be the sort of thing he was looking for.

Indeed, Harold seemed quite satisfied with this expression of her desire, and not another word was spoken for several minutes as they frantically untied and unlaced and unbuttoned whatever they could get their hands on between their many kisses, cluttering the impeccable floor of the study with their various garments. Catching a glimpse in her peripheral vision of the mess that they had made, Marian knew that they would have quite a bit of tidying up to do later, but for the time being, she cared about nothing but being as close to her husband as she possibly could.

When they at last managed to free themselves entirely from the encumbrances of their clothing and tumbled back to the sofa together, Marian fully expected him to begin caressing her in earnest, as he always did. Yet he kept his hands firmly on her waist, and though he was kissing her hard and deep, though every inch of their bodies was pressed skin to skin, their embrace was practically chaste compared to what she had been expecting.

"Harold?" Though it wasn't her intention, she couldn't help it when a little annoyance seeped into her tone.

Ceasing his kisses so he could pull back to look at her, he grinned widely, as though nothing in the world was amiss. "Yes, darling?" he inquired, maddeningly dodging the obvious reason for her confusion.

A little huff of frustration escaped her. "Well, aren't you going to – aren't we going to – "

He shrugged his naked shoulders, the motion revealing his muscles in a very fascinating way. "Forgive me, Madam Librarian, but I can't know what you want if you won't tell me."

"Of course you know what I want!" she protested, brazenly pressing her body to his, wrapping her legs around his waist, _anything_ that might get him to stop teasing her and proceed.

"No, I don't. There are _various_ options, you know." He lightly traced the outline of her ear with his tongue, reducing her to giggles even as she remained rather vexed by his actions.

Finally, Marian thought of a solution that might make things a little easier on herself. "Well, why don't you start by telling me what you want? You've not ever had a problem with that!"

"This is what I want: before anything else, I _want_ you to tell me what you want me to do, and then I _want_ to do it. Simple as that."

"Oh, I just couldn't," she breathed, feeling defeated by his insistence and her own inhibitions. "Not that I don't want to, but – I couldn't say the words. Not the way that you can."

"You don't have to use the same sort of words as I would. I know I can get a bit colorful at times, but please, sweetheart, just tell me _something_."

He spoke to her with such gentle honesty that Marian knew that this wasn't a request he was making out of mere fanciful lust, but out of love, out of a genuine longing to love her as well as he could and to help her conquer her anxieties. She had to try. Blushing furiously, she took his hands in her own, pressing one to her breast and guiding the other downward to the softness between her legs.

"I'm showing you," she told him, her voice trembling. "I don't know how to tell you, but... I can show you."

"That's a start," he responded, and, when he crushed her lips against hers again, he mercifully began to slide his fingers just where she needed them, the press of his cool fingers against her heated skin making her gasp gratefully... although he went too slowly, too lightly, and it was obvious that he was doing it to tease her. "Is that it?" he drawled in her ear.

She whimpered in mingled pleasure and frustration, pressing back against him. "No, _more_," she urged – while she was far from comfortable with making demands in terms that held any actual anatomical specificity, she had never had any problem with such simple imperatives, and she knew that Harold loved when she used them.

"That's good. Tell me," he murmured, increasing his motions obligingly. Still, he was making sure that it wasn't nearly enough to bring her to ecstasy, inflaming her lust more and more without providing the slightest hope of release. After over a month of physical intimacy, Harold knew her body so well that he knew exactly what to deny her, where _not_ to touch if he wanted to leave her unsatisfied – which had certainly never been his goal before, and hopefully never would be again!

Suddenly struck with a mischievous idea of how to thwart his insistence on maintaining total control, Marian slipped a hand down between them and ran her fingertips lightly up and down the length of his arousal, causing him to abruptly twist and shiver in her arms.

"That's not going to work, darling," he groaned, squeezing his eyes shut and gritting his teeth against the sensation.

"I find that hard to believe," she contended with a smile, the obvious effects that her touch was having on him belying his attempt at passivity.

Still, he shook his head and gave her a sly grin, though it was more than a little shaky as a result of her continued ministrations. "You seem to think this is a game, Madam Librarian, but I assure you that it's not. You've already won, my dear – just tell me what you want and you can have it."

Vivid images flashed through her mind of Harold fulfilling her every desire, transforming all her torrid pent-up need into the sweet, cool relief of euphoria, and all she had to do was ask... all she had to do was trust that she could say the words and that he wouldn't be repulsed by them, which he had already assured her would be the case... It seemed like such a small thing now, just a few words, and she searched her mind for them frantically.

He was merciless in his teasing, tracing little circles over and around all of her most sensitive parts but never daring to touch them, and it seemed like even her similar treatment of him was not going to be enough to goad him into going further. Marian burned with frustration, almost aching with the building unrelieved tension, and she suddenly remembered what they had been discussing earlier, the way that she had felt all those nights before their marriage, desire weighing her down like a hard knot in her belly – all at once she didn't have the power to endure his torment for another moment.

"Please, Harold," she gasped, her fingernails sinking into his bare shoulders. "I want you to – I want – "

Even in the midst of her sheer physical desperation, it felt unnatural to her to be so direct, but desire won out over modesty and the words flew out, ineloquent, embarrassing: "I want you to – to make love to me with your mouth," she stammered, and was instantly amazed that she didn't feel horrible for having said it.

"Then I'd love to," her husband responded without hesitation – though a flash of amazement in his eyes indicated his recognition of what a large step she had just taken – and in a mere moment he slid down her body and eagerly granted her wish, and Marian lost all consciousness of her words or anything else except the wonderful, wonderful things that he could do to her with that mouth of his, his lips and tongue and fingers working together to give her the most extraordinary pleasure. She was rendered helpless beneath him again, but this time was much different, so much better than the frustrating helplessness he had teased her with before, and she allowed herself to sink luxuriously into the incredible sensations he was creating within her. He had already wound her up so thoroughly that it hardly took long at all before she reached the height of ecstasy and she was sobbing his name in bliss, her back arching against the sofa before she finally fell back into a delightful listlessness.

When Harold returned to her side, he held her close, pressing his face to her neck and inhaling the scent of her before pressing a few gentle kisses behind her ear.

"Thank you," Harold whispered against her skin.

She giggled softly, still delirious from the shock of her climax. "You're thanking _me_? I haven't even done a thing for you yet, not that I don't intend to..."

"You know why I'm thanking you, sweetheart. For what you said, what you told me."

"You didn't play fair for it!" she laughed lightly. "You gave me no choice but to _beg_ you."

"But it worked, didn't it?"

"It did. Maybe that wasn't quite fair of you, but now that you've gotten me to speak up once – I think I'll be able to do it again."

"And you shouldn't have to feel ashamed for one moment. I absolutely loved hearing you say that to me."

"I'm not ashamed," Marian reassured him as she wrapped her arms around his chest and considered her feelings over the last few minutes. He had always been more than eager to perform that act upon her in the past, or any other that he had introduced to her thus far, but the idea that she now could bring herself to _ask_ him instead of just waiting to see what he would do was remarkably freeing. And, as uncomfortable as she had initially been with what he'd asked of her, she realized how truly lucky she was to have a husband who cared so much about her desires that he was actually concerned when she _didn't_ express them freely. She felt as though she had gained new footing with Harold, footing that she hadn't even been aware that she lacked. "Even when I'm unsure of myself, I could never feel ashamed with you," she told him.

Her music professor lifted his head and smiled that smile that was only for her, a gentle smile without a hint of pretense or showmanship. "Most of all, I'm happy to hear you say that."

As he pulled back to gaze at her, her eyes took him in again after a few disoriented blinks. He looked mesmerizing, naked in firelight... well, he was mesmerizing to her under any circumstance, but the changing dimensions of the firelight across his bare chest and arms seemed to add an extra allure to the whole vision. She was, however, surprised at the extent to which she had mussed his hair in the throes of her passion.

"Oh, I don't remember doing that," she noted amusedly as she ran her hand over his unruly thick locks.

"I should hope you had better things to focus on at the moment," he answered, a hint of smugness entering his expression.

"Clearly, I did," she admitted with a giggle. "_Wonderful_ things."

As Harold pulled her close to kiss her, Marian couldn't help but notice his hardness still pressing insistently against her bare thigh, and a little shiver of desire ran through her body once more as she considered that he had not yet attained satisfaction even once tonight. Obviously, they would have to remedy that situation as soon as possible.

"I don't believe we're done here, are we, Professor?" she murmured with a seductive little smile, brushing his disheveled dark curls from his eyes.

"Just getting started, my dear little librarian," he agreed, his hands already tracing the curves of her body as he spoke. "After all, it's a Friday night... and it's snowing... we have hours and hours to fill."

"Then," she whispered, letting her hands slide down his back to boldly cup his backside, "I think it's time for you to tell me what _you_ want..."


End file.
